This issue kind of fell by the wayside in all the WebM and Android violence, but apart from the cool things Google did this past week, they've also done something really bad. They claim it's a mistake, but the company has collected 600GB of data from open personal wireless networks in 33 countries through its Street View cars, prompting several countries to initiate official investigations into the search giant.

"if you leave your belonings in the middle of a city square without any protection, no sign that it's yours, and no warnings about eventual consequences of taking them, you can't expect they will remain untouched"

I never wrote nor implied the word expect .. yet regardless of whatever expectations you may or may not have on the future of your belongins, the nature of your rights upon it remains untouched.

They key is the will, and not what may or may not happen.

What its your's, its your's and will remain your's until you change your will and decide to transfer the whole or a part of your property right to someone else. And not even the State can take away your rights upon your property, as in order to do so it needs to pass a law and give you a fair compensation in exchange of your right.

And even with this silly example I only partially approached the stupidity of putting private data to be accessible by random individuals through an unprotected wireless connection.

No, you did not. You just proved that lack of protection in regards to the rights you have on your own property (of which the information you produce, be it personal or not is a part of), toghether with the restless abuses commited by the biggest corporation that mankind has ever seen and the blatant innaction of the goverments of some countries to protect those rights, have gone so long as to deform the perception and undertanding of one of the pilars of society, economy and foremost: democracy.

You may want to go back to 1689 and read John Locke's "Two Treatises of Government and A Letter Concerning Toleration.". Trusts me, you won't regret it.

... regardless of whatever expectations you may or may not have on the future of your belongins, the nature of your rights upon it remains untouched.
...

Wrong.

Sorry:

As soon as you leave your belongings unattended, or your information unsecured, it becomes, BY LAW, abandoned - unless it is protected by other laws ( trespass, spying, or what-have-you ).

At that point of neglect, you have forfeited your rights to said property or information.

If you accidentally e-mail everyone in your company a copy of your just-finished book, but meant to only send it to the publisher, all those other people have a free copy. You have not right to take that copy from them, because you forfeited that right. However, you still retain the copyright.

If you leave $500 in a public place, unprotected, and someone takes the money, they now own the money. You have no right to reclaim that money.

In these cases you neglected the security of your data or belongings, and therefore forfeited your rights upon them.

The same goes for unsecured wireless networks. Here, you are actually BROADCASTING your data to anyone who can listen. If you make an attempt to secure that data, it is illegal for someone to even TRY to obtain that data.

You have to realize that you had to do something to provide access in the first place - once access is provided, it is up to YOU to protect your data / belongings.

In one case you upload your data to everyone.

The next case, you leave your money unattended in an insecure location.

In the final case, you BROADCAST your data to a large area in an insecure manner.